1968: the Year the North Exploded Matt Collins

1968: The year the North exploded Matt Collins

t was a seminal year. One defined by the emergence and the one-party states of the officially “communist” of popular social struggles for progressive change on Eastern Block. Ian international scale,often involving new forms of It was a period when, globally, the pendulum seemed activism that shook the foundations of regimes across to swing in favour of progress, a time to “demand the the globe, which fleetingly hinted at the possibility of impossible” as Che Guevara once urged. In an Irish revolution and fundamental change for millions of context, demanding the impossible meant the struggle people. From the Black Civil Rights Movement in the US, to overcome sectarian division in the North, and the to the mass movement against the Vietnam War and the power of a government that had practiced widespread student and worker mobilisations that engulfed large discrimination and repression throughout its five- parts of Europe, through to the events of October ’68 in decade long history, all the while presiding over a Prague; when the Stalinist veneer of “actually existing” society marked by low living standards and poverty for socialism began to crack, as workers in the Czech working class people, both Catholic and Protestant. The Republic rose up to demand democracy and liberation. civil rights movement that exploded onto the streets 1968 was a generational rupture, and a period of great of Derry and Belfast in October 1968, represented the possibility. An era when it became possible to imagine Irish expression of the global revolt; a generational a world beyond both free market “liberal” capitalism wave of civil disobedience and grassroots activism–

IRISH MARXIST REVIEW 30 encompassing various strands of politics that were up genuine grievances inside the Northern Ireland temporarily united in opposition to the oppressive state, but was ultimately wrecked by a cabal of radical and discriminatory practices of the Unionist state. militants, who, at crucial points, pushed too far The violence and repression that met the civil rights ahead in pursuit of unrealistic goals and in doing so movementwas transformative, serving to lay the basis provoked sectarian violence.3 This approach involves for a protracted period of violence and conflict. a certain level of victim blaming, whereby civil rights Interpretations of this period speak directly to the demonstrators who had significant levels of violence causes of violence in the North, and 50 years on from inflicted upon them are essentially held responsible the emergence of the Civil Rights Movement and the for bringing about conflict. But it also involves a more period of violence that raged in its aftermath, we have specific argument, which views the role of radicals witnessed a systematic assault on the history of the civil within the civil rights movement as one that impeded rights campaign, in an effort to denigrate the memory of the possibility of a more gradual reform of the Northern the movement. Take Nelson McCausland—the former state at the beginning of the troubles.4 This article is, DUP MLA now turned unionist commentator— who in part, an attempt to refute this interpretation of the recently took to the pages of the Belfast Telegraph civil rights movement. In doing so, it explores the way in order to warn of the ground breaking fact that in which the upsurge of 1968 temporarily represented a republicans and communists were involved in break with past forms of politics in the North, opening establishing and organising the civil rights movement, up possibilities for a different course and a different in what appeared a lazy effort to repeat the myth that future, but ultimately being repressed and marginalised the civil rights movement amounted to a republican by the Unionist state, and later by British state forces plot to undermine the Northern Ireland state.1 This after military intervention in 1969. myth, of course, was the official line of the Unionist state in the late 1960s. It was strongly proclaimed by The Orange State pro-Unionist Party media outlets and it also served as The origins of the Northern troubles were rooted in events a rallying cry of aggression for opposition forces, led during the early 20th Century, which saw the partition of by Ian Paisley, who systematically abused civil rights Ireland and the birth of the Northern state. The state campaigners throughout 1968-1969. That this myth is that arose after partition represented a major setback easily refuted with basic historical study is seemingly for working class forces during the revolutionary period lost upon the Nelson McCauslands of this world. Such (1916-1923). It was a state established in the image of a debased analysis continues to get a hearing, however, the Unionist Party and the Orange Order, where the precisely because the effort to denigrate the civil rights position of the minority Catholic community was always movement is so deeply ingrained in various spheres insecure with intermitted strife commonplace from the of society today, particularly throughout academic beginning. The extent to which partition represented historiography. It is often categorised by a downplaying the maintenance of a colonial project was illustrated of the systemic nature of violence and repression by the military support that the new state could call endemic to the Northern state at this time, alongside a upon in any hour of need. This included a number of focus on the role of civil rights activists in “provoking” battalions of the British Army, the newly formed RUC, violence.2 and the formation of the Ulster Special Constabulary, Among an academic community that was strongly the notorious “B Specials”, anall-Protestant quasi- shaped by the violent conflict that raged in the paramilitary police force that essentially absorbed the aftermath of the civil rights movement, much debate membership of the pre-partition loyalist movement has ensued over the causes of the “troubles” and of the UVF.5 Such forces ensured a bloody beginning, historians have been keen to attach culpability to those and between 1920 and 1922 large scale pogroms and seen to have caused sectarian violence; toward this end sectarian violence occurred, predominately directed the radical left present an easy target. Throughoutmuch at the Catholic community, although “rotten prods” historiography, the narrative goes that the civil rights i.e. those deemed to be disloyal to the new state such movement was a well-meaning movement that took as Protestant socialist activists were also targeted.6 The violence represented the extreme end of repression, but The roots of the revolt 31 sectarian dominance became enshrined into the state Political opposition had not fared well inside the in more permanent ways. 1929 saw the abolition of the Northern state after partition, and the organised left proportional representation voting system, ensuring lived a fairly stagnant existence for some decades. The that parliamentary oppositional forces, such as labour two main traditions of political opposition that existed and nationalist, were pushed aside in the first past were the constitutional parliamentarianism of the Irish the post system.7 Further, election boundaries were Nationalist Party, and the Republican tradition of the designed in a way that ensured the Unionist Party would IRA. Both traditions were almost exclusively based in the return solid majorities where the Catholic community nationalist constituency and both essentially espoused a made up a majority of the population. The government form of anti-partitionism, albeit through very different itself boasted an all-Protestant membership that means. By the 1960s neither could claim much success: included a high ratio of members of the Orange Order, with the Nationalist Party confined to the fringes of and preferential treatment toward Protestants was parliamentary life, often ironically debilitated by its often encouraged. long-standing tactic of parliamentary abstentionism. Discrimination against the Catholic community The IRA, on the other hand, had embarked on its ill happened on a significant level in three key areas: fated “border campaign” between 1956-1962, which had electoral practice, employment and public housing. The failed miserably even by the organisations own terms.11 city of Derry became the classic example of electoral There was also a ‘third tradition’; the labour tradition, discrimination, where despite Catholics making up which sought to unite Catholic and Protestant workers over 60 percent of the population, Unionist politicians on a social and economic basis inside the Northern dominated the local council due to the gerrymandering state, largely through the structures of the trade union of boundaries. Regarding employment practices, movement and Northern Ireland Labour Party (NILP). a system developed that marginalised the Catholic During the Irish revolutionary period labourism was community and often confined them to unskilled, lower largely anti-partition. After partition and running into paid jobs.8 The divide was even more acute within the the 1930s it involved both pro and anti partition currents. higher echelons of the state. For example, at senior But by the 1950s the NILP had become a firmly pro- civil servant level, only one Catholic reached the rank union party, with the anti-partition sections splitting of Permanent Secretary between 1921-1968, and in the off into smaller groupings like the Irish Labour Party, judiciary no Catholics were appointed to the Supreme or later, the Republican Labour Party. Although the Court from 1925 to 1949. In terms of housing allocation, 1950s and 1960s saw a rise in electoral support for the discrimination was intrinsically linked to the restricted NILP, particularly among Protestant workers reflecting voting franchise that existed inside the Northern state, the parties labour unionism, social democratic and left where a small number of property owners had more than politics had not grown in the North of Ireland in the one vote, and a much larger number of the population, way that various European countries had experienced. amounting to over a quarter of the parliamentary By the late 1960s, then, a political vacuum had emerged electorate in 1961, were not able to vote at all, due to and oppositional politics in the North was reaching the franchise being restricted to owners or tenants of an impasse, as the traditional methods of politics had homes, or to the spouses of such owners or tenants.9 failed to achieve significant advances. Thus, for the next number of decades the minority Underlying the vacuum were profound social and community found itself in a precarious position at the political changes that swept Northern Ireland in the mercy of a Protestant dominated Unionist government. aftermath of the Second World War. The Northern state But although Unionist ideology implied that all presented an image of stability and indeed triumphalism Protestants had interests in common, living standards for Unionist bosses, being as it was strongly supported for both Catholics and Protestants at the poorer end of by the largest imperialist Empire in the world. However, the social and economic spectrum were on the whole under the surface it was a state that was built upon lower than the British average, and class antagonisms profound contradictions. The Unionist project had often developed within the state.10 emerged as a bourgeoning part of the British Empire,

IRISH MARXIST REVIEW 32 where pillars of industry including linen, textiles and in Ireland. Another major contributing factor to this shipbuilding provided the sustained economic ties generational shift was the introduction of the welfare that helped define Unionist ‘Ulster’, and its unique state. Proposed by a British Labour government and relationship to Britain. The state that emerged after reluctantly implemented by the Unionist party, the partition reflected this economic relationship, but the new welfare state delivered a large expansion of the irony was that although the Unionist state had seemed public sector, including homes and jobs. Particular powerfully intact since partition, the underlying importance in regard to the emergence of the civil economic trends were ones that pointed to the historic rights movement was the expansion of the education decline of the traditional base of the state. From 1921- sector, which contributed to a growth of Catholic white- 1968 the only real period of economic boom occurred collar workers and a confident middle class capable in the context of increased production during the of raising its voice against the grievances practiced by Second World War.12 It was a brief exception fuelled the Unionist government. Post-war housing schemes by the war economy, and the broader picture was one saw more public homes being built and these were of steady economic decline since partition. By the distributed through local authorities. But this meant 1950s the linen industry had virtually collapsed, and that in particular areas where Unionist majorities were shipbuilding entered permanent decline in these years.13 marginal, serious discrimination was at times exercised Economic regression saw factory closures and higher in order to maintain gerrymandered boundaries. In a unemployment, and as permanent decline loomed context where housing was already scarce this became a in the 1960s, the historic position of the Protestant central focal point for the civil rights movement.16 working class looked to be increasingly under threat. Therefore the 1960s brought about a contradictory These economic changes demanded a new process, where social and economic changes helped consensus, precipitating a form of liberalising create the conditions that saw a challenge to Unionist Unionism heralded by Prime Minister Terence O’Neill, rule being mounted. The Catholic community began to elected in 1963. O’Neill tried to revitalize the Northern sense an opportunity for advancement, while sections economy through a strategy that entailed attracting of the Protestant community were gripped by a sense of international investment, and this meant appealing regression, due to the decline of the traditional economy to sections of foreign capital that were outside of the and the emergence of a confident minority community. traditional employment patterns of the Northern This contradiction was central to the emergence of the state. Demand for economic change in the North civil rights movement and would continue to define the coincided with the southern state moving away from period that followed. a protectionist economic structure and opening up to British and foreign capital. Therefore, by the late Early civil rights activity 1960s the economic and material basis for the historic The emerging confidence of the minority community partition of Ireland was beginning to erode and this was had been expressed in early efforts at exposing housing expressed in attempts at new political relations. The inequality in Dungannon. In May 1963 the Homeless meeting between Terence O’Neill and Sean Lemass in Citizens League (HCL) was formed, which was 1965 signified the changing economic tides of the two predominately made up of Catholic women who initiated states.14 External political changes also seemed to shift some of the first instances of direct action of the 1960s.17 favourably toward those who would assert grievances The HCL precipitated a wider and more generalised against the Unionist government. After thirteen years campaign, with the founding of the Campaign for Social of uninterrupted Conservative Party rule the election Justice (CSJ). Launched in 1964 by two leading figures of a British Labour government in 1964, led by Harold of the HCL, Patricia and Conn McCluskey, it functioned Wilson, heralded an administration that was ostensibly as a pressure group and focused on gathering the extent more susceptible to efforts articulating the hardships of discrimination across the North. Its membership was that impeded the Catholic community.15 solidly of the professional Catholic middle class.18 These The ‘post-war consensus’ that characterised efforts were strongly complimented by the Campaign Britain,therefore, also saw a realignment of consensus for Democracy in Ulster (CDU), formed in 1965; it was largely a lobby inside the British Labour Party made up new kind of movement soon emerged out of changing 33 of MPs who were sympathetic to the cause of challenging local conditions and the powerful influence that the discrimination.19 global revolts of the late 1960s had on Northern Ireland. Although these organisations played a crucial role in documenting and publicising Unionist abuses of October 1968 power, any success they had in doing so was outweighed By the summer of 1968 the NICRA strategy of lobbying by frustration at the lack of action to address their was becoming exhausted, and sections of the association complaints. The strategy of both the CSJ and the CDU were realising the necessity of direct action. Behind was essentially one of highlighting and documenting the scenes of official politics a myriad of different discrimination in order to urge constitutional action. individuals were engaged in action around housing But these efforts were largely in vain. Early efforts at agitation, particularly in Derry,where for some months a redressing the sectarian imbalance faced considerable loose network of socialists had been agitating with some obstacles; such as the parliamentary convention at success around the issue of housing and unemployment. Westminster that ensured issues related to Ireland Members of the Derry Labour Party, republicans and would not be raised in the house, and a system of legal independent activists were leading local activity andin redress that lacked any real avenue for change and June 1968 they took actionto highlight the case of one greatly lagged behind the movement that would soon family who were forced to live in a dilapidated caravan, begin to gather on the streets.20 by dragging the caravan onto a main road through the It was against these obstacles that the best known Bogside area. The protest attracted widespread support of all civil rights organisations was born, the Northern and the family were re-housed.24 That same month, MP Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA).The idea Austin Currie raised a specific case of discrimination in of setting up a broad civil rights body was first raised housing in the area of Caledon, a small village in Tyrone, at a conference of the Wolfe Tone societies over 13- where a nineteen-year-old unmarried Protestant woman 14 August 1966. However, the aims and objectives of and secretary of a Unionist parliamentary candidate, the organisation were far from what would have been had been allocated a home despite a number of more considered traditionally ‘republican’, saying nothing qualified Catholic families in need. Currie joined a group about the British presence in Ireland nor even the of local republican activists and squatted in the home concrete grievances of the minority community, and in an effort to highlight the issue. The action sparked a instead focusing on issues of civil liberties such as formidable interest.25 freedom of speech and assembly.21 NICRA itself was The protest in Caledon led Currie and others to formally launched in 1967 and its broad basis appealed propose a public civil rights march and although it was to a coalition of forces, including nationalists, sections met with caution by some on the NICRA leadership, of the Catholic middle class, republicans who had moved the proposal won support and the NICRA executive away from the tactic of armed struggle and elements of called Northern Ireland’s first ‘civil rights’ march the organised left and labour movement. It also had from Dungannon to Coalisland on 24 August. The some tentative support and involvement from liberal demonstration attracted a broad base of support, Unionists.22 In its early formation NICRA’s agenda was primarily from the nationalist community, and largely based around defending citizens’ rights through mobilised over 2,000 people.26 Evidently, the march documenting legal abuses. The organisations’ own would not reach its destination and was blocked from history would later note how “For the first 18 months of entering the town centre of Dungannon by the RUC, its existence NICRA was nothing more than a pressure in the face of a Paisleyite protest. Scuffles broke out group… it rarely went beyond the stage of dignified and, eventually, after appeals from NICRA leaders written protest.”23 This cautious approach would be the march was wound down, but not before the crowd superseded as small public protests began to find a much began to sing “We Shall Overcome”27. The international wider resonance. Therefore, while the early campaign anthem for civil rights had made its way to the streets of for civil rights had hitherto been conducted through Northern Ireland. respectable and acceptable means, the potential for a Events in Dungannon provided the opportunity for

IRISH MARXIST REVIEW 34 the Derry radicals to call a civil rights march in their The presence of Queen’s students on the Derry city on 5th October, much to the consternation of the demonstration was no aberration. Across Europe in Nationalist Party.28 The march was to pass through the 1960s student radicalism emerged in an explosive the main “Unionist” area in the city, and was banned way that was rooted in changes in the university system, by Minister of Home Affairs, William Craig. After namely, the rapid expansion of higher education in the haphazard negotiations, the Derry radicals managed to post-war period and the increase of access to university get the support of NICRA. With socialists at the helm to those from working class backgrounds. In Belfast, this of affairs the 5 October march took on a distinctly class had the added impact of expanding access to university character that forwarded labour slogans. The placards to the Catholic community. Although once primarily the distributed by Derry activists read, ‘Tories are Vermin’.29 preserve of Protestant elites, by the late 1960s Queen’s A busload of the newly launched Young Socialist University was opened up to a hopeful generation of Alliance (YSA) from Queen’s University joined the Derry young Catholics who later ensured that demands for march. The YSA was essentially an independent version further empowerment gained traction. Significantly, of the Labour Party Young Socialists, established by these same developments would also produce a layer Michael Farrell in order to coalesce socialist activism of young Protestants who, for a brief period, identified at Queen’s and he took its name directly from its more strongly with the cause for civil rights and the US counterpart.30 The Young Socialists had been ‘global student rebellion’ than with the conservative sporadically active in Belfast throughout the year, for Unionist state. example, in organising solidarity around international It was in this context that the Belfast students issues such as the Vietnam War and against the Russian returned to their campus to launch further protests. invasion of Czechoslovakia. They arrived to Derry and A student Joint Action Committee that had protested joined the demonstration concurrent to a tense stand the banning of republican clubs the previous year was off occurring between the organisers and the police at resurrected and called a march from the University Duke Street. While the civil rights activists held a public to City Hall. So it was that on 9 October over 2,000 meeting, some of the more moderate leaders of NICRA, students took to the streets, their march immediately particularly Betty Sinclair, began to call on people to opposed by loyalist forces led by Ian Paisley. The disperse. Michael Farrell describes what happened next: students were blocked by the RUC in Linenhall Street, We were not having that. It was 1968, the year of stu- where they took part in a mass sit down protest. In the dent revolutions in Paris and Prague, of Mexico City aftermath of the demonstration, at a mass meeting in and the Chicago Democratic convention. We did not the University “The People’s Democracy” (PD) was think of ourselves in quite that league but going home born. The PD was perhaps the best expression of the peacefully meant letting Bill Craig and the RUC walk global revolt in Ireland. It reflected the autonomous all over us… Suddenly an RUC man rammed a baton student formations that were emerging across Europe into the belly of the man beside me. I did not even at the time; instead of a formal leadership, the group see the baton that hit me on the head and the next elected a ‘faceless committee’ of 10 activists. The PD few minutes were hazy. I only know that in the TV showed a distain for traditional forms of politics and a film of the events I can be seen on the ground being distrust of bureaucratic structure and organisation.32 In belaboured by an RUC officer with a blackthorn stick. its early formation it was influenced by the “spontaneity After that it was chaos.31 of resistance”, best expressed by the most known leader The RUC baton charged the crowd, which included of the French student revolt, Daniel Cohn-Bendit.33 three British Labour Party MPs, in a frenzied attack The new student revolts of the late 1960s rose rapidly to break up the march. The events of 5 October 1968 and moved fast, often counterpoising this militant in Derry marked a turning point, as the bloody scenes “vanguard” with the old left’s models of patiently were broadcast on television sets across the country. building a Party with a structure and leadership.34 That evening the first major rioting began across the This would prove problematic later, when questions city and barricades began to appear in Catholic areas. A of organisation and strategy confronted the civil mass movement was emerging. rights movement. In the weeks that followed student demonstrators would launch significant mobilisations cudgels and wooden planks, and civil rights supporters 35 in Belfast under the banner of The PD, to be met noted how the RUC openly fraternised with the consistently by oppositional loyalists. This coincided loyalists.38 The march was prevented from reaching the with the rapid spreading of civil rights activism across town centre, ultimately, the day had been one in which the North; for example, thousands marched in Derry on a legal march had been blocked by an armed loyalist 2 November. force, which the police had been, at best, incapable of challenging. In articulating a traditional Unionist The North at the Crossroads? response to the civil rights movement, militant loyalists With the glare of the world’s media firmly fixed on had begun to win the support of members of the police Northern Ireland, increasing pressure was brought force; it was this type of scenario that continually to bear on the Unionist government to enact reform. confronted the movement and laid the basis for a O’Neill’s position had become untenable: caught protracted period of civil unrest. between an intensified street agitation demanding civil Hard-line opposition to the civil rights demands rights and a loyalist backlash that sought to thwart it. strengthened and the Unionist Party itself was bitterly Inaction was no longer an option. On 22 November divided over the reforms. William Craig led the charge, the Unionist government announced a five-point and in the aftermath of the November announcement programme for reform, which included, a points system made sweeping sectarian speeches, attacking for public housing allocation, a complaints ombudsman the Catholic Church and blaming the civil rights to be modelled on the British system, and a development demonstrators for the violence in Armagh.39 Thus, when commission to implement the Londonderry Area Plan O’Neill appeared on television on 9 December to give and the abolition of the company vote.35 In a matter of the defining speech of his political career, it was amidst weeks the civil rights movement had secured a better circumstances of intense polarisation; with right-wing political advancement for the minority community than Unionists infuriated at the prospect of reform and decades of political stalemate. But although it was a civil rights activists increasingly alienated from his significant climb-down by O’Neill, the package fell short premiership. However, the violence that categorised the of the programme of reform envisaged by the civil rights previous few weeks also created the context in which movement; in particular, the fundamental grievance calls to reassert order found a hearing. In declaring, of ‘one man one vote’ would not be addressed, as the ‘Ulster at the Crossroads’, O’Neill appealed for calm manipulated electoral boundaries remained intact. toward the civil rights demonstrators, arguing for a Furthermore, the notorious Special Powers Act was to cessation of activity and an acceptance of a timeframe remain. O’Neill’s reforms essentially had the impact to implement the November reforms. Hitting out at of enraging the loyalist right, which reacted bitterly a ‘minority of agitators determined to subvert lawful against any form of concession, while failing to satisfy authority’ within the civil rights movement, he also the civil rights movement,of whom all major currents called out the “bullyboy tactics” of Paisley.40 The speech denounced the package as insufficient.36 brought events to a head inside the Unionist Party, and After the reform package was announced loyalist by 11 December William Craig was forced to resign his opposition intensified. In Dungannon on 23 November, position of Minister of Home Affairs. civil rights demonstrators were attacked by a mob of O’Neill’s call for calm had a resonance. It matched loyalists who were led by members of the B Specials.37 the mood of many of the moderates inside the civil The following week, a major NICRA demonstration was rights movement, some of who had been cautious of called in Armagh to reassert the fundamental civil rights action from the very beginning; both NICRA and the demands. Up to 5,000 protestors gathered to march, Derry Citizens Action Committee declared a suspension their path blocked by hundreds of Paisley supporters of civil rights mobilisation.41 In early December the PD who had descended on the town earlier that morning. had met at Queen’s, and after a long and contentious Paisley’s loyalists effectively took over the town ahead of meeting it was agreed to call off a demonstration in the civil rights march; shops and businesses were forced Belfast and a “Long March” that had been planned for to close as the loyalist crowd assembled, armed with Derry, on 21 December.42 For the socialist left of the

IRISH MARXIST REVIEW 36 PD, the call to cease mobilisation was a capitulation to One the eve of the march the PD released a statement, the Unionist Party, who had given no commitment to it conveys a message that is as relevant to contemporary fundamental reform. In effect, the civil rights movement interpretations of the march as to whom it was was being asked to help stabilise the Unionist state by originally addressed. Its opening lines read, “To those putting their faith in O’Neill. Michael Farrell and other of you who talk of provocation we can only say that a members of the YSA, who had already stated their non-sectarian protest against injustice can offend only intention to carry on with marching, called another PD those who uphold injustices… It is, perhaps, as well to meeting on campus on 20 December, which agreed for repeat that we are demanding not privileges but rights a march immediately in the New Year. The whole affair and that in marching to Derry we are merely exercising reflected the nature of the PD; it was a movement with another fundamental democratic liberty.”49 The march no real fixed programme or objectives, in which any was modelled on the Selma to Montgomery march, led decision could easily be overturned in the next meeting by Dr Martin Luther King, in Alabama in 1965. A pivotal and the most militant ‘leaders’ could set the agenda. moment in the US civil rights struggle had inspired what The decision to march on 1 January has been would become the most eventful march in the Northern presented by historians as one that had the support of Ireland civil rights movement. a tiny minority of students, who were warned against marching by the great and the good of the civil rights Burntollet and its aftermath movement. For example, Henry Patterson has stated The events that confronted civil rights marchers from that the PD march was, ‘Criticised by the mainstream 1-4 January 1969 have been well documented. PD leaders of the civil rights movement and with the marchers faced obstruction, intimidation, harassment support of only a few dozen students...’43 It is a frequent and violence throughout the course of the next four misrepresentation.44 The only public caution came from days, which exposed the deep backlash that was Eddie McAteer, who had a track record of opposing developing against the civil rights movement. The civil rights mobilization.45 Certainly, there was private major source of violence came from supporters of Ian disagreement within NICRA and other civil rights Paisley and his right hand man, Major Ronald Bunting, bodies, with Betty Sinclair and John Hume undoubtedly who declared their intent to ‘harry and harass” the among the most wary of marching. Yet much of the students along the way. The march faced a number criticism of the march was only revealed in hindsight. of blockades by loyalists armed with weaponry and At the time there was significant support. NICRA and cudgels, most notably at Antrim Town, Randalstown the DCAC had committed to a month’s long truce, and Maghera. The violence reached a crescendo, until 11 January, and therefore, physically joining the however, at Burntollet Bridge outside Derry, where a march was ruled out, but they did support the students large crowd of loyalists, made up of many off duty B in other ways. NICRA financially contributed to fund Specials, descended onto the march and violently beat supplies for the march, and its general secretary, John the civil rights activists. When the march re-gathered McAnerney, publicly supported the PD, stating, ‘…we after running the gauntlet of violence at Burntollet, it are wholeheartedly behind the People’s Democracy in was again attacked on the outskirts of Derry by a crowd this.’46 The DCAC, under the leadership of John Hume, brandishing bricks, bottles and petrol bombs, which announced that it would meet the marchers when reigned down at the marchers before another violent they arrived in Derry, and the Dungannon Civil Rights attack on the demonstration.50 The PD march began Committee urged its supporters to take part in the PD with some 40 students in Belfast. By the time it reached march. Both the Falls Divisional Labour Party branch Derry hundreds swelled its ranks and thousands in Belfast, and the Derry Labour Party voiced support gathered to greet the civil rights activists at a rally. That for the students.47 NILP Chairman Paddy Devlin, evening the B Specials brutally attacked the Bogside in too, supported the march and organised food for the a clear act of reprisal. Barricades were erected to defend marchers along their journey.48 Thus although a small against the police, and residents began measures to take crowd embarked on the march, they could claim wider control over the area. A makeshift piece of graffiti was support. daubed on a gable wall entering the Bogside, ‘You Are Now Entering Free Derry’; it was a slogan inspired by The official police report of the ambush was penned by 37 the campus revolt in Berkeley College during the US District Inspector Harrison, on 6 January, after news of civil rights movement.51 Free Derry was born. the attack at Burntollet Bridge had exploded throughout In the immediate aftermath of Burntollet a backlash the media. Harrison explained that no arrests were developed against the radical left, which ignored the made because ‘the police were fully engaged with glaring way in which state forces were involved in the getting the marchers through and crushing the attack’, attack and instead blamed the PD for bringing about he also claimed that, ‘the loyalists were attacked and violence. Terence O’Neill released a wholly one-sided baton charged by the police.’56 The credibility of the statement that denounced the “arrogance” of “foolhardy RUC reports are highly questionable, as no other source and irresponsible students”52. O’Neill’s statement cast testifies to a police baton charge against the loyalist him further out of touch with those sympathetic to attackers, or anything that resembled a ‘crushing’ of the civil rights cause, who had witnessed a peaceful the attack. The overwhelming evidence testifies that demonstration brutally beaten, seemingly with the the violence at Burntollet was directed at PD marchers support of elements of the state. Later, the Cameron with no resistance from the RUC; some activists even Report (1969), the British government’s official claimed that the RUC joined in at certain moments.57 investigation of events, laid down the conventional Testimonies from the Cameron Report itself indicate interpretation of the march regarding the PD, stating that the RUC were aware of the location of the attack. that elements in the PD had explicitly “sought” violence In one revealing interview, Cameron states that and that “their object was to increase tension”53. The undercover police infiltrated a meeting of Paisley and findings of the Cameron Report are of significance his supporters in Derry’s Guildhall on 3 January, where because of the way they have set the acceptable terms the final details of the attacks were arranged: of academic interpretation of Burntollet, and the role We know that there was at least one Special Branch of the radical left during the civil rights movement. The officer, if not a number of others, in the audience report presents the civil rights movement as a genuine that night taking a note of what was being said movement for reform that was wrecked by a cabal of and the position then was that they regarded the radical militants, who set out to provoke violence in situation as being so serious that they carried out a pursuit of a radical agenda. Particular fire is directed at reconnaissance in the vicinity of Burntollet Bridge. the PD and the Derry Left. By contrast, Cameron goes The obvious idea of which was to spot any snipers on to essentially exonerate the RUC as an institution that there might be in the area on the day in question. during the same events.54 Obviously they were afraid or must have been afraid It is highly problematic that this perspective has been that people would not only concentrate there with accepted so uncritically throughout historiography, something like scatter guns but that there would be particularly in regards to the Burntollet march, something there which would be much more lethal. since any feasible reconstruction of events regarding At this time there was information available to the Burntolletshows that PD marchers went to great lengths RUC of possibly very serious consequences.58 to maintain non-violence and press for the reform Other testimonies show that Unionist politicians programme laid out by the wider civil rights movement. who joined loyalist opposition along the route knew of Further, an examination of the evidence indicates that the location of the attack, and also the attackers. Both the RUC led civil rights activists into the ambush, which Robin Chichester Clark, MP for Londonderry, and was, at the very least, acquiesced in by important figures William Anderson, former Mayor and then MP for the in the Unionist Party. This was always the claim of civil City of Londonderry, were open about their opposition rights activists after the attack, yet historians have not to the march. The testimony given by both men to the investigated such claims with any rigor and Cameron Commission reveals much about their knowledge of the rejected them as ‘wholly unjustified... baseless and attack, Anderson admitted that ‘I had heard there was indeed ridiculous.’55 After the attack the RUC officers likely to be trouble for the march and I and Chichester- charged with policing the march themselves went out of Clark went out to Burntollet, where we heard there their way to misrepresent what happened at Burntollet. was going to be some trouble.”59 More revealing were

IRISH MARXIST REVIEW 38 Chichester Clark’s comments, who knew of ‘more contradiction that the left faced, in that small groups of extreme Protestant groups’ in the community who had socialists had gathered significant support, but lacked began counter activity, adding ‘I have no intention of the political and organisational coherency to offer a way naming them…”60 forward during the crisis of 1969. Thus, after sectarian One does not need to engage in speculation repression reached a crescendo that summer, the left surrounding these comments to draw two conclusions; found themselves on the margins and overcome by firstly, that high-ranking Unionist politicians were events. aware of an attack and its location, but also, that they The loyalist backlash against reform intensified were privy to the identities of those who carried out the throughout 1969. UVF bombs forced O’Neill out attack. Taken alongside the evidence already presented of office in April, and civil rights demonstrations that suggests the police knew about the planned increasingly ended in violent scenes. The major turning attack, it seems feasible to conclude that the ambush point, however, came with the yearly loyalist marching happened with the knowledge of key elements of the season in August 69 – an annual display of Orange security forces and the government. Such evidence is triumphalism, but one that took on added significance rarely considered among historians who focus on the in the aftermath of 1968. In Derry, after small scale riots “provocative” actions of civil rights activists. Indeed, broke out between youths and the RUC, an uprising the actions of PD marchers, which were consistently broke out – the ‘battle of the Bogside’. Revolt spread non-violent throughout the course of the four days, across the North after civil rights activists demonstrated stand in contrast to both loyalist counter demonstrators in order to take police pressure off Derry. Violence was and state forces. The “Long March” to Derry was by widespread and Belfast experienced unprecedented definition a conscious attempt to challenge sectarian repression after Catholic crowds marched on police division through the power of Catholic and Protestant stations during 13 and 14 August. Members of the RUC self-activity, and the new left were among the most anti- and the B Specials were at the forefront of attacking sectarian and non-violent forces of the period. Catholic residents alongside loyalists, during scenes that included the deployment of armoured vehicles, 1969 the fateful year which traversed West Belfast unleashing heavy machine Burntollet was indicative of the wider experience gun fire.62 By 15 August hundreds of Catholic homes throughout 1968-1969; a non-violent movement had been burnt to the ground. The worst disturbances violently attacked and subsequent repression unleashed were in the west of the city, where Bombay Street was against significant sections of the Catholic community. set ablaze, as well as the Catholic enclave of Ardoyne The violence and repression, however, did not simply in North Belfast. In Belfast alone six people were come from the fringes of the hard-line Loyalist right, killed, including a nine-year-old Catholic boy, Patrick but from the state apparatus. This process increasingly Rooney. The Scarman Report, set up to investigate alienated the Catholic community from the state, and the disturbances in the summer of 1969, estimated as the North teetered from civil rights to civil strife, the that 1,820 families fled their households between July, upsurge against the Unionist state continued. February August and September; 1,505 of these households were 1969 saw an election in which the minority community Catholics, which made up 82.7 percent, or 5.3 percent of further asserted its demand for rights through the ballot all Catholic families in the city.63 The crisis precipitated box; the Nationalist Party lost significant ground to a British military intervention, whose primary aim was to number of newly elected MPs who had took part in the strengthen Unionist rule. civil rights campaign.61 The PD stood in 8 constituencies Amidst the repression barricades went up in Belfast taking 23,645 votes. One student, Fergus Woods, came and Derry, and autonomous zones where the RUC 220 votes from being elected an MP to the Stormont could not enter were established. “Free Derry” was the parliament. The electoral highpoint came later in April height of the resistance, where MP Bernadette Devlin 1969, when Bernadette Devlin was returned to the led the defence of the area, and state forces were Westminster parliament as MP for Mid Ulster, with effectively driven out of the Bogside until October 1969. over 33,000 votes. Devlin’s election summed up the “Free Belfast”, too, lasted some weeks as a large part of Catholic West Belfast became a “no go” area where a socialist republic and not just into a republic which 39 British troops and RUC forces could not enter. Socialists might at some future date become socialist. Firstly played a crucial role in these uprisings, through Citizens the border must go because it is a relic of imperial- Defence Committees, which sprang up to organise much ism, and in order to root out imperialism we have to of the resistance in Belfast and Derry. Yet, much like root out the neo-imperialist set-up in the South and its involvement in the wider civil rights movement,the the neo-colonial one in the North. Secondly, North- left was largely submerged into these and lacked an ern Ireland is completely unviable economically and organised force. In Belfast, for example, PD student only exists as a capitalist entity at the moment be- activists were active behind the barricades, producing cause of massive subventions from Britain. Similarly newspapers and running pirate radio stations to pump the South on its own is an area of small farms with out propaganda against the RUC and British troops. very little industry. It too is completely unviable on Eamonn McCann later took stock of the period, its own and as a result is also dependent on Britain. noting the powerful obstacles that faced the upsurge in The unification of Ireland into a socialist republic is 1968-1969;the deep rootedness of sectarianism and the not only necessary for the creation of a viable econ- power of the state, the tight grip of communal of politics, omy, it must also be an immediate demand, because and the inability of the wider left and trade union only the concept of a socialist republic can ever movement to stand effectively against the repression, all reconcile Protestant workers, who rightly have a very resulted in difficult terrain for the left. McCann noted: deep- seated fear of a Roman Catholic republic, to the “The realistic possibility we did have, and didn’t take, ending of the border.66 was of recruiting relatively rapidly from the masses of The loose group of radicals around Farrell was too angry, urgent working class youth whom we had helped small and flimsily organised to put such a perspective bring onto the streets, and perhaps entering 1969 with into practice. What of the bigger battalions on the left? a revolutionary socialist organisation a few hundred The Communist Party of Northern Ireland was involved strong.”64 in NICRA since its inception. Its role, however, had been one that largely warned against a strategy of political The left and the struggle in the North action, such as marching and street mobilisation, in Part of the problem was the political incoherence on favour of a more gradual campaign to reform the state. the left. During the heady days of 1968, almost the CPNI leading figure Betty Sinclair, for example, was entire left had been united in assuming that partition one of the most vocal moderate voices on the NICRA was irrelevant to the struggle for civil rights. When executive, both in arguing against mobilisation and the PD emerged, for example, it had explicitly stated, in championing the reforming capacity of O’Neill’s “we regard the border as irrelevant in our struggle for administration, against those who sought to directly civil rights.”65 It signified a generation that viewed with confront the government.67 disdain the way in which conservative politicians and The socialism of the CPNI looked to the Soviet block clerics had clung to the national question with such as a form of ‘actually existing’ socialism. In Ireland, this tenacity, on both sides of the border. Others on the left informed a strategy that saw the potential for socialist viewed the question of partition as one that ought to politics emerging through the structures of the state. be parked until a later date, after democratic reforms Democratising the Northern state was seen as the first had been realised. The obvious problem, however, “stage” in this process.The CPNI saw NICRA ‘as the first was that reform had been consistently blocked by the step towards a broad electoral alliance for replacing Orange machine, which relied on sectarianism for its the Unionist regime with a ‘progressive’ government survival, and purported a wholly exaggerated view of at Stormont.’68 This meant, in practice, an acceptance the threat the civil rights demands posed. Overcoming of the constitutional position of the Northern state and sectarianism, then, inevitably meant overcoming the a postponement of raising questions such as partition power of the state. Elements of the left did understand or workers’ control until a later date, presumably this. Michael Farrell laid out his view in 1969: until after Northern Ireland had experienced a stage The border must go, but it must go in the direction of of democratisation. Throughout the 1968-1969 period

IRISH MARXIST REVIEW 40 the Communists clung rigidly to this perspective. The the history of the trade union movement during the civil major problem facing proponents of the “stages theory” rights campaign and the outbreak of the troubles is a by 1969 was that events indicated how their first stage— history of failure in challenging the sectarian practices a process of democratic reform within the structures of the Northern state. Recognising this does not dismiss of partition— had been wholly unachievable. As Mike the positive record of many trade unionists in the North. Milotte argues, the CPNI were able to punch above their Many activists did of course make valiant efforts to weight in the early days of the civil rights campaign: stop the slide into sectarian violence. But too many key “Their ability to influence events waned, however, figures in the trade union movement stayed quiet in the when the masses took to the streets in ever-increasing face of growing loyalist reaction and state repression. numbers and evaporated entirely when the guns came Some were worse: actively supporting pogroms against out”69. Catholics. Too often individuals with deeply bigoted A similar but more acute process of supporting the views were allowed to hold office unchallenged. For institutions of the state increasingly cast the Northern too long state repression was unacknowledged and the Ireland Labour Party (NILP) as irrelevant among absence of the official trade union movement, even in the Catholic masses. The NILP reached its heyday in the early stages of street agitation during the civil rights the mid 1960s, and entered 1968 with a substantial movement, is glaring. electoral base, albeit primarily in Protestant areas. The The most important trade union intervention into Party essentially advocated a parliamentary solution to the early troubles came in August 1969, when in the the issue of discrimination, arguing that a return of a wake of Bombay Street being burnt to the ground, shop Labour majority in elections would best secure the civil stewards in east Belfast agitated against the threat of rights demands.70 Thus, while NILP members played a serious attacks on Catholic workers in the Shipyards, role in the early civil rights campaign on an individual and possibly prevented a repeat of the pogroms of the basis, the organisation was wedded to supporting 1920s. But these efforts were never generalised across partition and sought to use the state structures as an the union movement, and the response from ICTU arena to transform society. As the state stepped in was essentially to argue for a restoration of “law and to repress the civil rights campaign the party found order” (while barricades went up to defend against state itself essentially falling behind state repression. For repression), ignoring the fact that it was the very forces example, the NILP joined the Unionist cabinet in 1971, of law and order, such as the RUC and the B Specials, the same year in which internment without trial was who were the central force of violence at this time.72 introduced. By the time non-violent anti-internment This would be the picture as things continued into the marchers were gunned down by the British Army on 1970s, and as British troops showed their ability to the streets of Derry on Bloody Sunday in January 1972, repress the Catholic community more effectively than NILP MP Vivian Simpson endorsed much of what the the B Specials or RUC ever had, support for the forces government was saying about the atrocity from the of “law and order” took on a more reactionary hue. The floor of the Stormont parliament, while failing to offer whole sorry period was well summed up in the fate of any words of condemnation toward the military.71 It the often lauded NILP activist Sandy Scott, who led illustrated how disconnected the NILP were from the opposition to violence in 1969 only to end up taking part growing movement against internment and to ‘Smash in trade union delegations to the Unionist government Stormont’. that called for tougher security measures in the run up Perhaps the main current with the potential to to internment, alongside future leaders of the UDA. In transform the situation in the North was the trade union one such delegation, in June 1970, the trade unionists movement. Elements of the labour movement had been told the government “It was possible that some Roman involved in pushing class politics to the forefront of civil Catholic workers might be gently requested to leave for rights agitation, but they had done so in a largely formal their own good”, before going on to warn: and tokenistic way during the early period of NICRA, It was also possible that there might well be cases when letter writing and lobbying was the order of the day, of intimidation and it was hoped that they would as opposed to active street mobilisation. More generally, be permitted to deal with them. It was also hoped that the management would be understanding in its Executive Act (1971), was a clear concession won by 41 attitude to small groups of men who might gather in the civil rights campaign. Yet the overriding lesson of the yard.73 the civil rights campaign was that the primary force of Unionist Minister for Commerce, Robin Bailie, ended violence and division was the existence of the Northern this particular meeting by giving a commitment that state itself. he would speak to management about the latter point. 50 years on from the civil rights movement and the The inability of the trade union movement to challenge history of 1968 points to an upsurge that contradicts loyalist ideas inside the working class movement directly the conventional view of oppositional politics in the facilitated the rise of the loyalist backlash against North, which is often presented as a straightforward reform, which, for example, mobilised significant layers choice between the politics of armed struggle or in Protestant workers demanding the introduction constitutional nationalism. The political convulsions of of internment in 1971 and later culminated in the the late 1960s gave a glimpse of a time when, briefly at Ulster Workers Council Strike in 1974, a reactionary least, people power emerged in a way that heralded the attempt to restore Orange rule in the North.74 None possibility of a different form of politics, one based upon of this should denigrate the remarkable role played by internationalism and the struggle for working class self individual trade unionists, or the best elements of class emancipation. The challenge of 1968 in Ireland was, in solidarity in the history of the labour movement: there essence, the challenge to re-forge the politics of James is a rich tradition of unity too. But there was a rotten Connolly; categorised broadly by anti-imperialism and history of acquiescence in the face of sectarianism as anti-partitionsim, a rejection of the pan-class nature of well, not always as extreme as that of the beginning theUnionist and Nationalist projects, and the advocacy of the troubles, but usually with the same features: a of a 32-county socialism based upon revolutionary class refusal to condemn state repression, an unwillingness politics, and Protestant and Catholic workers’ unity. to challenge sectarianism within the movement, and Today, faced with a sectarian state that continues to the advocacy of support for the institutions of the state deny rights and fails to deliver for working class people, above all else. the task of re-forging the politics of Connolly remains.

The re-forging of Connollyism British military intervention after 1969 crystallised the question of partition in the North. It was an intervention dictated by well-worn and often brutal colonial strategies: internment without trial, shoot to kill, and “counter insurgency” operations, such as the use of loyalist paramilitaries as allies, to name a few.75 The level of state violence in this period was the major contributor to filling the ranks of those forces who had Notes an immediate answer to overcoming the state, through 1 “Why unionists must ensure that the true origins of the the tactic of armed struggle, namely, the Provisional civil rights movement are not forgotten”- available online, https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/opinion/columnists/ IRA. The state’s reaction to reform created far bigger nelson-mccausland/why-unionists-must-ensure-that- grievances than of those originally highlighted by the the-true-origins-of-the-civil-rights-movement-are-not- civil rights movement, and this in turn called into the forgotten-36456850.html question the reformability and legitimacy of the state.76 2 Dan Finn provides an excellent critique of this tendency But it must also be remembered that any significant in, ‘The Point of No return? The People’s Democracy and gains made during the civil rights era came about the Burntollet march’, Field Day Review (Dublin, Field Day Publications, 2013). primarily through mass popular struggle from below, not as a result of armed actions carried out by the few. 3 See, Henry Patterson, Ireland Since 1939: the persistence of conflict (Dublin, Penguin Ireland, 2006), p. 209. Also The development of the Northern Ireland Housing see, Simon Prince, Northern Ireland’s ’68: Civil Rights, Executive, for example, established after the Housing Global Revolt and the Origins of the Troubles (Dublin, Irish

IRISH MARXIST REVIEW 42 Academic Press, 2007). guarantees for freedom of speech, assembly and association. 4 Finn, ‘The Point of No return?’ p. 7. 5. To inform the public of their lawful rights.’ Ibid, p. 133. 5 Jonathan Bardon, A History of Ulster, p. 475. 22 Milotte, Communism in Modern Ireland, p. 264. 6 bid, p. 494. 23 NICRA, “We Shall Overcome...” available online, http:// cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/crights/nicra/nicra78.htm, accessed 7 John Whyte, ‘How much discrimination was there under on 08/08/2015 the unionist regime, 1921-1968?’ Contemporary Irish Studies, ed. Tom Gallagher and James O’Connell (Manchester 24 McCann, War in an Irish Town, available online, http:// University Press, 1983), available online, http://cain.ulst. cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/crights/mccann93.htm ac.uk/issues/discrimination/whyte.htm#chap1 25 Purdie, Politics in the Streets, p. 135. Austin Currie, All Hell 8 Ibid. Will Break Loose, (Dublin, O’Brien Press, 2004), pp. 96-98. 9 Ibid. 26 Bardon, A History of Ulster, p. 652. 10 As Seán Mitchell points out in an important history of class 27 NICRA, ‘We Shall Overcome’, available online, http:// struggle in the 1930s: ‘In the 1930s Northern Ireland was the cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/crights/nicra/nicra782.htm poorest region of the United Kingdom: by every standard of 28 For an account of the march from its principal organizer measurement living standards in Northern Ireland were far see, McCann, War and an Irish Town, pp, 39-41. below the British average, and by the end of the 1930s average 29 Eamonn McCann, ‘The National Health Service and the income per head in the North was just £64.7 compared with struggle for civil rights’, War and Peace in Northern Ireland the UK average of £111.’ Seán Mitchell, Struggle or Starve: (Dublin, Hot Press Books, 1998), p. 27. working class unity in Belfast’s 1932 outdoor relief riots 30 The YSA was launched informally at Queen’s in June 1968 (Chicago, Haymarket Books, 2017), p. 40. and contained many members of the Labour Party ‘Young 11 The IRA’s own public statement drafted to announce the Socialists’, including those who on the Derry march. Its first end of the campaign stated that, ‘The decision to end the chairperson was Michael Farrell and it publicly announced its Resistance campaign has been taken in view of the general presence on 5 October, see the Irish News on 5 October 1968 situation. Foremost among the factors motivating this course for their press release. of action has been the attitude of the general public whose 31 Farrell, ‘Long March to Freedom’, Twenty Years On, p. 55. minds have been deliberately distracted from the supreme issue facing the Irish people- the unity and freedom of 32 Cameron Report, para 195. Arthur, The People’s Ireland.’ Bowyer Bell, The Secret Army, p. 334. Democracy. 12 Bardon, A History of Ulster, p. 516. 33 Daniel Cohn-Bendit, known as ‘Danny the Red’, was the most notorious leader of the student uprising in Paris and was 13 Ibid, pp. 627-628. a central figure of the French left for some period. Today he is 14 Allen, 1916, pp. 136-138. a Green MEP. 15 McGarry and O’Leary, Explaining Northern Ireland, p. 257. 34 Daniel Cohn-Bendit and Gabriel Cohn-Bendit, Obsolete 16 As John Whyte explained, ‘Housing policy in individual Communism: The Leftwing Alternative, (New York, McGraw- areas, such as Fermanagh or Dungannon, could be very Hill book company, 1968), p58-63. unfair. The civil rights agitation of 1968 was sparked off by the 35 Prince, Northern Ireland’s ’68, p. 185. allocation of a house at Caledon, in Dungannon Rural District, 36 Farrell, The Orange State, p 248. to an unmarried Protestant girl who, as the Cameron report said (1969: para. 28), could 'by no stretch of the imagination 37 Irish News, 25 November 1968. The Cameron Report . . . be regarded as a priority tenant' when there were Catholic (1969). families in the area badly in need of housing.’ Whyte, ‘How 38 One civil rights activist who ventured amongst the loyalists much discrimination was there under the unionist regime?’ recorded the scene in which police officers chatted amicably with loyalists ‘who carried broken off planks and vicious six 17 Purdie, Politics in the Streets, pp. 82-88. inch nails protruding from their ends, with young girls and 18 Ibid, p. 94. For an example of their publications, see, boys of 15 who had metal bars and lead piping and with men Northern Ireland: The Plain Truth, Issued by the Campaign who sported bill-hooks, axe handles and table legs.’ Detonator for Social Justice in Northern Ireland (Dungannon, 1969) newssheet, No. 3, PRONI, D3219/3/28. Also see, Sunday 19 Geoffrey Bell, Troublesome Business: The Labour Party News, 1 December 1968. and the Irish Question (London, Pluto Press, 1982), p. 104. 39 Irish News, 3 December 1968. 20 Purdie, Politics in the Streets, pp. 118-120. 40 Ulster is at the crossroads-Television broadcast by Terence 21 The key demands were: ‘To defend the basic freedoms O’Neill, PRONI, CAB/9/B/205/8. of citizens. 2. To protect the rights of the individual. 3. 41 NICRA, ‘We Shall Overcome’. To highlight all possible abuses of power. 4. To demand 42 Evidence submitted by Michael Farrell to the Cameron Commission, PRONI, GOV/2/1/218. 64 McCann, the roots of revolt, available online, http://www. 43 43 Patterson, Ireland Since 1939, p. 209. marxists.de/ireland/mccann/oct1968.htm 44 For example, Bew and Gillespie virtually repeat this line, 65 Manifesto of the People’s Democracy, 1969, People’s stating that ‘There was little support for the march from Democracy file, NIPC. the outset— only a few dozen left Belfast— and proscribing 66 ‘Discussion on the strategy of People’s Democracy’, New it might have brought little reaction.’ Bew and Gillespie, Left Review, 1969. Northern Ireland, a Chronology of the Troubles, p. 12. 67 In 1969 Sinclair released the following statement with 45 McAteer did not support the march in Derry on 5 October other “moderates” after walking off the NICRA committee and warned that it ‘isn’t good marching weather in more than in protest against the PD: “All we needed was time...a lull one sense’, Irish News, 30 December 1968. in which to see if Captain O’Neill is going to carry out the 46 Sunday News, 29 December 1968. reforms he had promised. But the PD would not give us time and their political views are infringing on the non- 47 Irish News, 31 December 1968. political aims of NICRA...We have been taken over by people 48 Paddy Devlin, Straight Left: an autobiography (Belfast, preaching the most extreme form of revolutionary socialism, Blackstaff, 1993), p. 93. the sort of politics that have been causing trouble in France, 49 Irish News, 31 December 1968. Germany, Japan and many other parts of the world.” Arthur, The People’s Democracy, p. 61. 50 Egan and McCormack, Burntollet (London, LRS Publishers, 1969). 68 Milotte, Communism in Modern Ireland, p. 264. 51 Eamonn McCann took the slogan from ‘You are now 69 Ibid, p. 281. entering Free Berkeley’ in Berkeley College, 1965. 70As Aaron Edwards explains, ‘Arguably, the NILP was ill 52 Irish News, 6 January 1969. equipped to meet the challenges posed by the transformation of politics in the late 1960s... because it was deeply wedded 53 Cameron Report, para, 100. to the process and fundamentals of British parliamentary 54 Thus, while the RUC are criticized, particularly during 5 democracy. As such, it could not (and would not) fathom October (1968) and 5 January (1969) in Derry, they are on or condone a turn to street politics or civil disobedience.’ the whole exonerated for having ‘acted with commendable Edwards, A History of the Northern Ireland Labour Party, discipline and restraint under very great strain and provocation pp. 145-146 from various quarters’, Cameron Report, Para. 168. 71 The timidity of Simpson’s intervention is most striking, 55 The best activist account of the march is found in, Egan endorsing some of Faulkner’s speech he did not speak out and McCormack, Burntollet (London, LRS Publishers, 1969). against any of the claims surrounding the violence and was on Cameron Report, para 183. this occasion uncritical of the both the government and the 56 Letter from District Inspector Harrison to County military, calling for, ‘new political initiatives so that we may Inspector: Civil Rights March from Belfast to Londonderry, get to the point in time that violence will not be uppermost in 1—4 January 1969, PRONI, CAB/9B/312/5. our minds.’ Stormont Hansard, 1 February 1972, Volume 84, 57 See, Egan and McCormack, Burntollet and Bernadette pp. 37-38. Devlin, The Price of My Soul. 72 Geoffrey Bell, The British in Ireland A Suitable Case for 58 Evidence submitted to the Cameron enquiry by Robin Withdrawal (London, Pluto Press, 1984), p. 80. Chichester-Clark, MP, PRONI, GOV/2/1/252. 73 Report of a delegation of trade unionists from Belfast 59 Evidence submitted by Commander A. W. Anderson MP, Shipyard to Stormont Castle, 29 June 1970, Civil Rights to the Cameron inquiry, PRONI, GOV/2/1/102. Campaign in Northern Ireland, PRONI, CAB/9B/205/12. 60 Evidence submitted to the Cameron enquiry by Robin 74 For an account of the UWC Strike see, Robert Fisk, The Chichester-Clark, MP, PRONI, GOV/2/1/252. point of no return: the strike which broke the British in Ulster (London, Times Books, 1975). 61 The three elected were, John Hume, Ivan Cooper and Paddy Devlin. 75 Margaret Urwin, A State in Denial, British Collaboration with Loyalist Paramilitaries, Mercier Press, 2016. 62 Scarman Report, pp. 121-123. 76 Niall O’ Dochartaigh, From Civil Rights to Armalites, p. 311. 63 Ibid, p. 248.

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